A strong small-town business economy starts with partnerships. And in the small Michigan town of Howell, community leaders and nonprofits have intentionally built a strong collaborative network that has resulted in award-winning success.
Several years ago, the nonprofit
Howell Main Street dreamed up what would eventually become
Howell Summit Gardens, a quirky, family friendly downtown park. The community’s all-in mentality turned an improbable idea into a reality ― an example of the collaborative spirit that underlies Howell’s bustling downtown, says Kate Litwin, who spearheaded the park project.
Small towns have less access to business investors than metro areas. They have a smaller labor pool from which to draw trained workers and are less likely to attract the notice of philanthropic organizations. They typically have fewer organizations working to counteract hurdles to business growth, such as workforce development, housing, and transportation.
That’s why collaboration plays such a vital role in rural areas, and why the
Michigan Municipal League included Howell in a recent study of rural and urban-fringe towns with strong local economic networks. MML wanted to tap into Howell’s recipe of partnerships and help it build an even broader network that incorporates regional and statewide partners.
Recently voted the best main street in the country by USA Today readers, Howell’s downtown proves the power of teamwork in small, rural communities, Litwin says.
“That’s the story,” she says. “How this community can come together and create something amazing.”
Start small and build relationships
As head of both Howell Main Street and the Howell
Downtown Development Authority, Litwin knows nothing gets done unless groups work together.
Some five years ago, an unkempt parking lot just north of downtown shops caught Litwin’s imagination. What if, instead of an unsafe eyesore, the lot could become a pleasant public space that attracted more people downtown?
The lot eventually became Howell Summit Gardens, but not overnight and certainly not without a lot of moving parts.
A $24,000
Play Everywhere grant from
KABOOM!, through the
Ralph C. Wilson, Jr. Foundation, gave Litwin's vision legs, but it fell short of the $300,000 project Howell Main Street designed.
Then, the COVID-19 pandemic produced scores of workers with time on their hands. “What if we take all this manpower and turn it into something really cool?” she wondered at the time.
Galvanized, the community pitched in to make Litwin’s revamped parking lot dream a reality.
The Howell Department of Public Works employees fired up their backhoes. A local brewery owner paid his idle employees to spend a week tamping down soil and building a wood labyrinth. Litwin didn’t have to beg for help ― people called and asked what they could do.
A corporate donor OKed the redirection of a $100,000 donation to the park. Other entities threw their back into the project, donating time, materials, and supplies, from excavators to decorative trees and shrubs. The finished project came in at just over $132,000, the rest covered by donations.
Thanks to $750,000 in new federal funding and a $2 million Michigan Economic Development Corporation grant, the parking lot makeover will soon expand to include a pavilion, ice rink, fire pits, and water feature.
The project’s success reflects what Litwin sees as Howell’s strength: its commitment to working together. She credits that spirit with earning the city a
2018 Great American Main Street Award from Main Street America for stimulating economic growth as it rebuilt its downtown.
That success and Howell landing the most votes for USA Today's
2024 Best Main Street Readers' Choice Award stem from collaboration. Howell nonprofits partner to organize events, promote arts and culture, and provide resources for local entrepreneurs. Downtown businesses co-create shop-local programs and participate in promotional campaigns. The city built outside partnerships with
Michigan Main Street and
Michigan Economic Development Corporation to secure funding, technical assistance, and training for projects.
“It’s all about those relationships,” Litwin says, “and building that trust back and forth, so that we’re all doing something really good.”
Cross-pollinating what works
In 2022, the Michigan Municipal League studied Howell as part of a pilot program exploring entrepreneurship and small business support systems in southeast Michigan. With the financial backing of the Ralph C. Wilson, Jr. Foundation, MML spent months studying systems in Howell, Brighton, and Monroe, towns they identified as having strong economic networks supporting equitable small business environments.
MML wanted to learn how such towns compensate for gaps in resources “and then cross-pollinate these ideas,” says Richard Murphy, senior program manager who led MML’s engagement with Howell.
A
2023 report summarizes MML’s recommendations for Howell leaders. Lessons learned from Howell contributed to a best-practices
toolkit and resource guide that was recently distributed statewide. MML is currently conducting similar work in six other small towns.
Howell follows what Murphy called the “stone soup model” to build its economy, making the most of the collective abilities of people and entities, from city leaders to entrepreneurs to small local nonprofits. Everyone benefits from the partnerships, he says.
For example, frequent collaboration with the DDA and other groups has helped
Livingston Arts Council get art into the community. In turn, that art attracts visitors, boosting the downtown economy, says Arts Council Vice President Sharon Fisher.
From downtown murals to sculpture to summer band concerts, “It all adds to individual happiness, whether you realize it or not” ― and happy people are more likely to spend money, Fisher says.
The MML study also delineated ways Howell could extend what it already did well by seeking partnerships outside the community.
Rural communities may need help making such connections. For example, well-connected organizations like MML can connect small towns with regional and state lenders that don’t typically market to small regions, Murphy says.
Howell and the other towns in the pilot study named transportation, housing, and job training as even higher priorities for supporting new businesses. Partnerships with regional and state entities can help bridge those gaps, too ― for example, by exploring a regional bus route that connects rural areas to colleges offering entrepreneur programs.
MML and similar organizations “can tie towns into the broader fabric of collaboration so they can reach out and take advantage of some of those resources when they need them,” Murphy says.
Rewriting the equation
Getting dollars into small communities requires teamwork on still another level.
Ralph C. Wilson, Jr. Foundation is entrusted with $2.3 billion earmarked to strengthen 16 counties in Southeast Michigan and Western New York over 20 years. Putting that much money to work “ain’t gonna happen without partnerships, period,” says Jim Boyle, foundation vice president of programs and communications.
Oftentimes, small communities lack nonprofit infrastructure to keep up with the grant writing and reporting that helps major metros obtain financial support for significant projects. Realizing this, the foundation uses partnerships with fellow grant makers and nonprofits to make sure that funding is directed to "places that sometimes it’s hard to get money into,” Boyle says.
That included the $25,000 KABOOM! grant that ignited work on Howell’s play space and financial support for MML’s study of Howell and other rural communities.
In that venture, the foundation provided funding, MML offered a toolbelt of resources, and Howell leaders came to the table with a “coalition of the willing” and a plan. That’s the kind of collaboration that helps rural communities get things done, Boyle says.
While smaller communities “punch above their weight, they’re under-resourced, at times overlooked, and uninvited to tables,” says Paul Riser, foundation senior program officer overseeing the collaboration with MML.
Partnerships on a regional or state level can get them “to that equation of one plus one equals three,” Riser says.
Maintenance through listening
Even a strong collaborative framework can encounter hiccups, says Janelle Smith, president of the
Howell Area Chamber of Commerce.
In Howell, “People know how to play in the sandbox together,” Smith says. Still, when the town boomed with numerous local events several years ago, communication breakdowns spiraled into frustration among event planners.
In response, the Chamber of Commerce invited key players to a series of downtown merchant meetings to ask what needed fixing.
“Trust me, at first, it did not start off well,” Smith says. Since then, however, the once-tense quarterly meetings have become a stabilizing, solutions-focused force downtown.
In addition to its direct work with merchants, the Chamber partners with a host of public and private groups that address affordable housing, workforce development, employee training, transportation, and child care, reaching outside city limits to problem-solve.
Small towns sometimes fall prey to territorial thinking, but collaboration within a region is the surest way to get everyone the resources they need, Smith says.
As an example, seven communities, including Brighton and Howell, share a marketing authority and tourism
website called Explore Brighton Howell Area.
It all starts with listening to each other, she says.
“When you have a disagreement but you can have a conversation about it and work to a solution, that’s progress,” Smith says. “And that’s what continues to move Howell forward.”
This story is part of the Nonprofit Journal Project, an initiative focused on nonprofit leaders and programs across Metro Detroit. This series is made possible with the generous support of our partners, the Ralph C. Wilson Jr. Foundation, Michigan Nonprofit Association and Co.act Detroit.